Have you ever wondered where you could have been if you’d been given what you asked for? Have you ever wondered what could have happened, had you found what you sought?

Have you ever wondered where you could have been, had the door you knocked on been opened? After all, the Word of God says, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7).

At one point in my life, everything I asked for seemed not to be in the shop, and every door that I knocked on seemed to be double bolted from the inside.

Left out in the rain, I wrote to my friends, “Where is God when I hurt? What kind of father is He, that He gives me a snake when I asked for a fish and a stone when I asked for bread?”

I was tempted to say, “Dad, I hate you. I wish I did not know you,” just as any little child could say to a loving father who denies the child a chocolate because he knows a healthy diet is needed in that moment.

May I invite you to Luke 15:11–16 to see how God answered my questions? Thank you, Father, for not giving me my portion. Thank you again for the closed doors.

And thank you for keeping the poor in our neighborhoods, for giving us sponsored children and their parents. Because if they had found what they sought, the Church would not have had the opportunity to introduce them to the full gospel of Christ. Most of these children would probably be worshiping false gods.

Thank God for keeping many people poor until His time comes, for when it comes they all shall sing like Job, “My ears had heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you” (Job 42:5).

“Stand firm, and you will win life.” —Luke 21:19, NIV

Prayer: Lord, help us to stand firm and wait on you in the storm and the uncertainties.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Habtu Mulata Assefa works as a Partnership Training Specialist for Compassion Ethiopia.